Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Health Care: Untie Insurers' Hands

To date in the 2008 campaign, we have yet to see any candidate recommend eliminating the insurance companies from the health care equation. Everyone seems to remember what happened to Senator Clinton's plan during President Clinton's tenure, and they're unwilling to go out on a limb. So if insurers are to remain a part of the system, let's cut them loose from regulations that are doing little to protect consumers and more to hurt them. In my own insurer's FAQ, I found this little gem:

Are the underwriting guidelines the same for all states?

No. Every state has certain guidelines that we must follow. Some states will allow us to exclude, rate-up or decline. Certain states only allow us to accept or reject with rate-ups and others are just accept or reject. Finally, there are states that we cannot decline or issue with exclusions or rate-ups.

Though I haven't researched it, I'm guessing my state is one of the "accept or reject" states as nobody would even discuss exclusions with me when I pursued private insurance. The reason states like mine did this was likely an attempt to protect their citizens, but in the end, all they did was make it impossible for those of us affected to get any coverage, much less bad coverage.